Transforming Space 15 Twenty into a teenage bedroom seemed obvious to Petra and me, so I’m not quite sure how that thought process went. We share a fascination with the idea that this is sort of one’s sanctuary as a teenager; a place to make your own world even though you’re kind of stuck there. We didn’t do this all with a specific girl in mind; we just wanted to create a mutant dollhouse that a cult of teen girls might live in. And for a week, WE DID.

Being a teenager can be lonely as hell, and in such moments, two things seem somewhat holy: friendship and fandom. They create a sort of strange magic, if you will. The teenage bedroom is usually where these two are recognized for being so powerful, so we decorated all surfaces like altars, and built the furniture up on shrine-like platforms, with help from everyone at Space 15 Twenty.

This meant obsessively arranging a bunch of music memorabilia and memories of friendship our readers generously brought us on the road.

The front window, decorated by Petra’s sister, Anna, with photos from The Ardorous.

Since we were basically creating a commune housing situation for the Rookie cult, we felt a treehouse/clubhouse was inevitable.

Some girls told us about the Ouija results they had in there, and almost everyone signed the walls.

Glow-in-the-dark ceiling stars! So important.

One of my best friends at home, Claire, made these beautiful paintings to decorate the treehouse.

It was really fun to decorate the shelves to match the photos Petra had curated.

Claire also let us place a couple of her journals in the show.

One of our readers gave us this gorgeous drawing when we were on the road.

A letter I dorkily gave Claire freshman year.

Another reader gave us this amazing Leonardo DiCaprio box she made in Seattle.

I got this Supremes record at Long in the Tooth, the record store we had our road trip meet-up at in Philadelphia.

The same Seattle reader gave us this bumper sticker as well.

That creepy little girl is my sister when she was little.

The 45 on the left is by Bleached, who played our closing party.

This photo is from the Teen Witch shoot Petra and I worked on together for Rookie back in October.

Too many nice on-the-road souvenirs from our wonderful readers to count! Plus, my Carrie soundtrack, which we listened to when we stopped in Carey, Ohio.

Ah, the dresser. A vital component.

Another one of Claire’s journals, and all-important stickers.

Loteria cards, and a tapestry my mom made years ago in the back there.

Anna did most of the painting job for all the cute flowers and planets on the furniture.

This might have been my favorite part. Was it the vanity? The Stevie Nicks stuff? The giant purple boob? Probably the combination of all three.

We didn’t want to theme the shrines too specifically, but all the dried roses and cacti and potions just needed to be with Stevie.

One of our readers brought us this amazing box she decorated!

Another gave us this journal with an adorable cover, but I thought we’d display this page instead because it made me teary-eyed. (Please understand that between the three week-long road trip and setting up the installation, it was the MOST STEREOTYPICALLY FEMININE MONTH OF MY LIFE. Also, Petra and I were both on our periods while we were setting all this up. So, there’s that.)

It’s true!

This is also true.

Petra’s amazing vagina piece!

WHAT IMPRESSIVE PIPE CLEANER BENDING. (That was me, I bent the pipe cleaner!)

Perfect handwriting by Anna.

Perfect banner by Hazel.

Now, we move into the window seat/desk area. Please note the wonderfully eerie locks of hair on the wall.

Records and books.

And more records and more books.

Please take note of the collection of Sweet Valley High books, this fan I got at a flea market that just has girls in bikinis on it, and Beach Boys crushing.

This zine by Jen Tong is one of my favorite things EVER. Ever. The fantasy landscape in this fold-out part was so perfect for our own fantasy world.

These two Ardorous works are also by two Rookie illustrators — Minna on the left, and Beth on the right!

Petra ingeniously (or PERVERTEDLY) put stained underwear on the floor by the bed.

I got that blanket at the vintage store we had a road trip meet-up at in Iowa City. Claire painted my guitar last summer, and Anna went over it in Strange Magic colors for the installation.

On the day we uninstalled everything, Petra, Anna, and I just passed out on the bed eventually. Thank you so much to everyone at Urban Outfitters and Space 15 Twenty for allowing us to do this and being so helpful along the way. Thank you, also, to everyone who sacrificed to us souvenirs of their own teenage bedrooms so we could make this installation special. Without those additions, each with their own story, it would’ve looked like a vintage reproduction of some messy old room. I hope it brings you all comfort to know everything has been shipped back to my house, where I can’t bring myself to pack any of them up for storage. I AM SURROUNDED BY YOUR LIVES AND MEMORIES. It’s a little creepy but mostly cool.

I am sad that the installation is gone and that I cannot live in it anymore but it was so beautiful. I am so glad you all documented it since my documentation is utterly insufficient (I think my amazement led to thoughts of ‘how am I going to even photograph all of this magic??’)

I’m almost crying because of this perfection. I’ve had the whole teen bedroom idea so long and t’s just this, exactly. My life would’ve been so much different without Rookie – I did not have the chance to meet any of you on the Road Trip but Tavi, you’re truly my hero. You know those obsessed fans who tell singers they saved their lives? Tavi, you saved mine. Because of you, and Rookie, and your blog, I got into writing and feminism. Without all that I probably would not have survived stupid angsty teen life. It’s still an everyday struggle, and I totally sound like a creep (I have been creepin’ you on social networks as well – I’m sorry) but you’ve meant so so so much for me in the past and you still do, each day. I’ve been wanting to tell you for so long and here I am.

Aw, thank you Narita. The fact that you’re able to get so much out of all this reflects much more on you than me or anyone at Rookie! Also, it’s not creepy to tell someone who clearly puts shit online that you like it. No worries. Wish I could’ve met you on our trip! Hopefully there will be an opportunity in the future.
<3

It’s like a dream, ugh. I sooo wish I lived in america and could have gone to see it! I rearranged my room last week though and I’d like to think it emulates this/this emulates it! My mum’s only complaint was that I can’t dust because of all the the shrine like arrangements that I constructed and are haphazardness perched everywhere, oops.

So sad that I couldn’t see this in person and it’s already been taken down. I’ll trade my bedroom for this one, anytime. Except I would add a lot more fandom-related things, like Harry Potter and Sherlock and Game of Thrones. That stained underwear by the bed is a nice touch, Petra.

This is the most perfect art installation ever. Ever ever. I still cannot get over Petra’s amazing vagina piece. So glad to see my box in pic 51! These photos are a dream. Every girls fantasy land. Beautiful job. I wish I could have seen in in person!
xo, Torihttp://generationscollective.blogspot.com/

I’ve been waiting for this post for soo long to see what the installation turned out like!!
The title is just perfect i can only imagine walking in and it to be raining glitter

The concept of girls’ bedrooms becoming our most personal self creation is so real and how you have created the perfect example by piecing together other’s is dreamable.

The trait of holding on to childhood but everything else naturally delivering your into womanhood is perfectly (again!!!!!!) represented in this installation and the layers and clutterdness add to the confusion.

So amazing i can’t thank you Tavi and Petra enough and everyone else!<3

So many memories! I took a few pictures on my iPhone, but there was so much to remember and see that I eventually gave up knowing I’d never encapsulate all of Strange Magic. Glad Petra was able to get every bit of it! I’m totally going to be coming back to this page anytime that I want to remember the BEST WEEK EVER!!!

I FEEL LIKE ROOKIE LIVES IN THIS MANIC PIXIE DREAM WORLD THAT CODDLES EVERYTHING IN A HAZE OF PINK AND VAGINAS AND IT’S IMPOSSIBLE TO TELL WHAT’S BEING REVERED AND WHAT’S BEING MOCKED AND THE WHOLE THING BOTH MIRRORS MY LIFE AND FEELS WINKINGLY INAUTHENTIC AND I CAN’T DECIDE IF I LIKE IT OR NOT. I THINK I DO. BUT I KINDA WISH THINGS WOULD BE STARK AND CRISP AND DIRTY AND MATURE EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE, TOO.

I feel you. I love everything here and would like it all in my room now, but I’d like a little more variety in the themes. Bring on the gritty, the macabre, and the desolate! But I guess that’s what fall is for.

I love this so much. I’m actually crying at this very moment because I couldn’t have been there for it. Tavi You are such an inspiration. I love all of this <3 Thank you Rookie I don't know how I could ever have lived without y'all :):):):):):):)http://thelunalovingbookworm.tumblr.com/

I love Rookie. When I have a crappy day at school or just in general, I can always go home and count on Rookie to have a perfect article or inspirational photoshoot. What you guys do is honestly so inspirational that I’ve decided that I want to write for a publication or website like Rookie when I grow up.
I love you guys, in the way that you love a complete stranger that you at the same time feel like you know really well, you know?
Visit DC one day! We have cool stuff.http://slinskter-grrrl.tumblr.com

thank you so so SO much! i have been DYING to see these and have been a total creep trying to track down pics. its so accurate of what, at least for me, being a teenaged girl looked like. excellent and magical!

ROOKIE IS THE BEST! AH this installation was just so beautiful and I think all the events encapsulated perfectly the VIBES that were needed. I mean, hello, a bunch of teenage girls hanging out together making stuff and bonding and all being AWESOME? strange magic, it is.

This is beautiful! I need to redo my room. Every little detail in that space really made the whole room special. :) I just realized I forgot to give you guys my favorite sea turtle figurine at the meet up!

And oh my god Tavi I laughed so hard from: “Also, Petra and I were both on our periods while we were setting all this up. So, there’s that.”

This is awesome <3
I was just wondering: I sent something in to you guys over a month ago and I still haven't gotten a response is that normal? Will I even get a response? Sorry hope that comment didn't come of as jerky…

i want to tear up at all these wonderful teen bedroom vibes. thank you rookie for doing this, although i couldn’t be there, you guys are just da best and such an inspiration. love you x999991992239123084

I don’t know whats better… the glorious amounts of fake flowers, the Fleetwood Mac albums or The Outsiders quotes, the glitter… You lovely lasses have made the best shrine to teenage-hood that anyone could ever imagine!

Fantastic, there’s so much in there to explore! Good vibes. Reminds me of a much more welcoming (less depressing), dreamier version of Tracey Emin’s ‘My Bed’ sculpture. I would definitely put on a record and brush my hair at that dresser :]
I dig the treehouse, that’s definitely one of those “childhood things I never had and am bitter about it”, hah.

My goodness, I seriously just shed a tear. I’m not really sure why, but I think it had something to do with the fact that this installation so accurately represents my life, and it is all so perfect. It has this brilliant balance between the childishness that we have grown out of, and the pressures to be older and more mature as we all grow up. The stickers and plastic beads and cubby house and candy mixed with skulls and Petra’s incredible photos from “The Hairless Norm” and the dresser with all it’s virgin mary candles make for something so relate able. I so so so wished I could have seen in in really life, but to be honest I probably would have never left.

This is just too much to handle!! I wish I could have gone to the installation! I want to cry it’s all so perfect and pretty and inspiring and amazing. I hope Petra/The Ardorous start making posters of their work! I want to cover my walls in all their art!

I almost cried. But if I really cried, that would be tears of happiness, because it was so powerful idea.
And I just developed new plan how to spend the rest of my holiday: I am going to turn my room or our whole flat into my private rookie exhibition. I hope my parents wouldn´t mind.

THANK YOU EVERYBODY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

and, by the way, the most important thing is to believe in Sherlock Holmes, as somebody wrote (picture no.9
Thank you, sista :D

It’s so cool and beautiful. I wish I could’ve been there to see it in person. It sucks living in Scotland right now. I really want to make my bedroom look as much like that installation as possible. It already kind of does but it could be better! I just find this really inspiring. Everyone coming together and making something which represents a lot of what we all care about.

My name’s Courtney, I brought Tavi a Heart record and copy of the parent trap on VHS (to jog your memory), I took photos of the event and asked some questions for my blog, including a -very- short Q&A with Tavi and Petra. The blog post is now up! So, for more photos, and to see what everyone wore, please check out my post!

I am so sad I couldn’t join this road trip – I would have loved to meet all those awesome people.It sucks living in Germany. Are there any Rookies in Germany? Want to meet you, like NOW! I will decorate my bedroom today and I need glitter. And I will just add my zine for Tavi Gevinson (yeah, it’s about her.) to one of those shrines in my thoughts.

Hi, queen people! April’s theme is BOTH SIDES NOW, which considers the many different answers to THE BIG QUESTIONS, whatever those are for you. If you’ve got a project or pitch about seeing things in a whole new light, please email it to submission@rookiemag.com.

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Rookie is a website for teenage girls. With monthly-themed content, we update three times every weekday, and once a day on weekends. Click here to find out where to send stuff you'd like us to see. Learn about the people who write this thing here.